Well, this thread has come along way in my absence.
All of which the majority of people in the know believed at the time.
Your opinion.
How do you figure? He was out of power in a month, captured within seven, what more do you want?
I really don't think you understand what's going on. Well first of all, you think the President exaggerated, and that's your main opposition to the war? Did you oppose the war before we went in, or only after a certain length of time elapsed without finding stockpiles of biological and chemical weapons? Hypothetically, if they found that Saddam smuggled weapons into Syria, would that change your mind? I'm not going to throw up links to articles about people who think that happened, I'm just curious, if tommorow Syria fessed up and undug the thousands of barrels of nerve gas Saddam passed to them at the begining of the invasion would that matter to you?
But when I say I don't think you know what's going on is that you seem to have a very narrow view about what the Iraq war is all about, because Iraq is just the most visible battle in the global war.
We get people who come in here all the time (some have posted in this thread) who say, 'Iraq didn't attack us on 9/11, al-Qaeda did', or say 'we should be going after the leaders not wasting time in Iraq', or say 'well most of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudis, why don't we attack them?'
People who say 'Iraq didn't attack us on 9/11, al-Qaeda did' misunderstand who the enemy is.
People who say 'should be going after the leaders not wasting time in Iraq' underestimate our capability.
People who say 'well most of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudis, why don't we attack them' are ignorant of our strategy.
The enemy is not the 19 guys who attacked us on 9/11, nor is it the one group that organized the attack. The enemy is every fascist moslem who seeks the downfall of the US, every disgruntled moslem who follows the fascists, and every two-bit dictator who provides some form of aid to the fascists. That is alot of people. It includes Kim and Fidel, al-Qaeda and Hezbollah, a handful of other dictators, several terrorist organizations, and maybe hundreds of thousands of otherwise average people.
The enemy has many faces, all of which need to be addressed in a seperate fashion. In order to not be forced to kill the hundreds of thousands of otherwise average people (after all, we could just nuke everyone, like they would us if given the oppourtunity, but we are the good guys) we need to show them not only that their leaders are wrong and going to lose, but that there is another way for them to live their lives that doesn't involve killing innocent people. That's what Iraq is all about. It's about showing our enemies if you think you can snub your nose at us, conspire to attack us or conspire with forces that wish to destroy us, and brutalize your people we are going to take you out. Iraq was a message to the two-bit dictators.
The only problem with it was all the complaining from the U.S. and Europe about it. Sure, it scared them at first, Ghadafi shit himself, the Iranians got real quiet, Kim protested but it sounded more like a frightened animal than a strong affronted enemy. Then something happened. People over here started bitching and moaning. Not alot of people by any means, but their voices were amplified by a media that agreed. France complained, it was amplified as if France's opinion were important. Cracks in the armor, and the two-bits saw it. Iran is now blatantly saying their going to proceed with their nuclear ambitions, North Korea is demanding a nuclear reactor again, Fidel and Hugo are getting all chummy. The psychological impact of Iraq is being squandered.
As for our capabilities, we still have nearly 20,000 troops in Afghanistan 'going after the leaders', along with other NATO forces, but most people seem to conveniently forget that when it comes time to enumerate the reasons why 'Iraq was bad', as if every soldier in the US military was now wandering aimlessly around Baghdad getting shot.
Our intelligence, in conjuction with intelligence agencies around the world, are constantly arresting people.
But you don't see that, and you won't see that.
Most everything you see is the most visible aspect of this war, and that is Iraq, and despite all the spin, we won the war, we are kicking the shit out of both domestic thugs and foreign terrorists there, and the Iraqis are stepping up to take over for us so we can leave.
It bothers anyone with a heart and a soul. Do you think it doesn't bother people who disagree with you about the war? Do you really think it doesn't bother the President. The only difference is some people believe the sacrifice is necessary.
Emotion can't be an obstacle to action when action is necessary.
Whenever you feel like it, but one might hope that it would involve a better future for all the innocent people involved.
I don't agree to that.
